This comment was posted to reddit on May 19, 2017 at 6:48 am and was deleted within 12 minutes.

Anyone here managing without medication by choice?

I have gone without treatment for several years now, but not after trying to manage my mood swings with medication and weekly therapy sessions for almost 15 years. About 5 years after my initial diagnosis, I was approved for SSD disability, but not until I had lost my job and alienated most of the close people in my life. Right now, I live with a distance family member and lead a very isolated life. My approach, which some might object to, has been to reduce my stress to as low as possible by doing as little as possible. Obviously not having to go to work helps. My experience with the medications I was prescribed was that they usually were effective, but for only a short while, and symptoms inevitably returned in some form or another. Also the side effects and feeling I was "muted" were a problem. Eventually it became tedious and frustrating constantly trying to assess my mood and having the meds adjusted. Since I now feel like the damage has been done and my life has been irreparably altered, so I just go with the flow. I still have pretty severe depressive episodes, but my elevated moods have been mostly contained to only mild hypomanic ones by avoiding triggers. Fortunately, I don't feel suicidal, otherwise I would seek professional help again.